Monday, October 31, 2011

A new look is on the way! (It may take a while to get things all settled... depending on how these days go :)

Also, if you use a feed reader (I love googlereader) and would like to read my blog there, please let me know. Jordan set up a fancy schmancy way to make it work even though this blog is private. I just send you a unique url that you add as a new subscription and it works just like any other blog. (Pretty cool!)

Last week we had a night where the temperature dropped pretty suddenly. The next day, the ginkgo tree right outside our front door lost all of its leaves (!!!) All morning and early afternoon it looked like it was snowing out our front windows, but it was just the tree dropping all of its leaves.

Landon was asking all day to go out and rake and he had a blast playing in the soft feathery leaves (they dropped so quickly they were not crispy or crackly at all like normal). Though this tree was the most drastic I saw, all the way to school that morning the trees had round pools of leaves surrounding them. Seasons change quickly here! (Today was a beautiful Fall day -- tomorrow the snow is coming...)

This little Owen just surprises me at how fast he is growing! A week or so ago he started sitting up well enough that I felt like I could let Landon sit behind him and guard him sitting - but he had to be on very constant watch with his arms out ready to catch. Within a couple of days, I realized Owen wasn't falling over any more -- he's a sitting guy now and he just loves it.

Friday, October 28, 2011

Ellie has been carrying around these tinkertoys for the past few days searching for bad guys. "Let's go fight some bad guys!" she says. Or, "I'm the person who shoots the bad guys -- follow me!" Then we march through the house with Ellie's sing-song voice sending out commands -- "Oh! I see a little tiny mean guy on the fireplace! I will shoot the mean guys with my shooter thing!" Then off we go again "March, Mommy!" she calls then down the stairs with Ellie singing "We're looking for some mean guys... we're looking for some mean guys... and we will fight the mean guys..."

I think if it wasn't so funny to hear sweet little Ellie in search of the ever elusive bad guys I would probably work harder to encourage some different kind of play :) (It's all the sillier because she has no idea what shooting actually is -- the roughest she's gotten was to gently sweep an imaginary mean guy off of a seat chair. Otherwise we 'fight' the mean guys by saying 'go away mean guys!' or more often something like 'please will you go away mean guys?')

And some side notes --

One evening last week Jordan went online to look for some more tinkertoys to add to the kids' collection. He was pretty tired and amid the commotion of getting the kids to bed and other distractions, he forgot how ebay works and ended up bidding on 4 sets. Sadly (for him) but happily for the kids, he won three of the bids so we will have a lifetime supply of tinker toys at our house!

I made Ellie's cute skirt with my freshly serviced and repaired sewing machine! I hadn't realized how often I was using it until I had to go almost a week without it while it was at the repair shop. And oh it sounds so smooth and beautiful now without all of the crazy noises it was making! (I guess you are supposed to have your machine serviced more frequently than 7 years or so...)

Jordan just now took down that Happy Birthday banner (from the picture above). It has been on our front room wall since Landon's birthday (in July!) Time for some new decorations I suppose :)

Saturday, October 8, 2011

Jordan took the kids on a 'campout' this morning to let me sleep in a bit. (The word campout is a loose term at our house. For Ellie it means sitting on the backstep and eating marshmallows :) They bundled up and went up the canyon and spent the morning playing while I slept in and then cleaned and cleaned and cleaned with some lovely music for company. I even managed to take a walk around the house and take down the last remaining Springtime and 4th of July things, and put out some better fall decorations (Did you notice it was October? Two crazy things on the same day this week -- it snowed at our house and I spent 5 minutes glancing at Jordan's calendar (hanging in his office, still on July) before I realized that no, it's not July anymore. Not August even. Not September... October! When did this happen?)

Other Fall fun --

- Making salsa with April

- Picking apples, making apple pie

- Harvesting our garden - so fun to step outside and pick something to add to dinner right while I'm cooking.

Most of these are pictures that I copied from here or here (aren't those darling sites?) -- but I drew them with my own hand -- no tracing or anything, just looking and drawing and erasing and fixing...

While Landon does his homework, I get out my drawing and we work side by side on our projects. I've always wanted to draw but thought it was a talent I just didn't have and could never learn. It's so exciting to be learning! To see the shape of something and be able to copy it with my own paper and pencil... it's kind of a thrill for me! Each time I finish a little person I have to go show it off to Jordan because I'm so excited to see what I've done.

Sunday, October 2, 2011

Last night Landon and Ellie and I read a story called "The Three Wishes" where an old man and his wife are granted 3 wishes by a little dwarf and end up using all 3 wishes in silly ways. After the story, I asked them what they would wish for if they could have their own 3 wishes -- here is what Landon came up with:

(Version 1)

1. Everything I'll ever need for the rest of my life.

2. A cat and a dog

3. A horse

(Version 2)

Actually, to be a horse! (But only on the condition that when I (mom) get my wishes, my first wish is to change him back into a Landon. :)

(Version 3)

1. Mom to have triplets

2. Triplets again

3. Everything I'll need for the rest of my life.

(Version 4)

Actually, instead of triplets again, that next wish will be that mom doesn't have to take care of the triplets -- that they will just be all taken care of already by the wish.

This morning Jordan took the kids fishing while I slept in. He came in early and whispered 'you can sleep as long as you want' before whisking away Owen and the kids. Not knowing they were going fishing, I spent the morning sleeping in and out and in the back of my mind half wondering how Jordan was keeping the kids so quiet and then enjoying the reassurance from my half asleep dreaming that he was just using his magic. (Something like this -- a vague, sleepy thought of 'why don't I hear more footsteps above me? followed by 'Oh Jordan's just using his magic to push the sound away. How sweet...'

Welcome!

Want to send a note or leave a comment?

Why 'Tuesday Flowers' ?

When we first started dating in college, Jordan left me flowers at work in a beautiful little blue-green vase with a note, "Tuesdays are for flowers, don't you know?" More than 10 years later, Tuesdays are still for flowers and they are such a bright and happy part of life!